Countdown to Apple's 'notebook' launch

Just a few hours now till Apple turns its spotlight to notebooks - as per the wording on its US invitation. Messrs Jobs and Co will be taking to the stage at the Town Hall event in San Francisco at 1pm local time, which makes it 9pm UK time.

Since all us UK hacks will apparently be tucked up in bed by then, dreaming of deadlines and word counts, Apple's promised Mobile Computer a look at the new merchandise tomorrow afternoon so stand by for a flurry of photos and videos at that time. Meanwhile, read on for more.

Last minute rumours have included some 'cast iron' price points, courtesy of a Boy Genius Report mole, that puts the starter price at a credit-crunch busting $899 (£530). Meanwhile Engadget has turned up the blurry MacBook Pro image on the left - claiming it has dual NVIDIA GPUs - and poured cold water on the $899 rumour, saying the cheapest in the line-up will be $999 for the current 2.1GHz white MacBook.

Naturally we'll keep an eye on what our US colleagues get to see overnight and post some updates as soon as the coffee machine warms up. Better make it Columbian - extra strong.

[ Apple]